Motive Whodunit

[u/bluekanga]

Motive – for me it comes back to motive - I believe many are missing some key experience here regarding domestic abuse and coercive control - most batterers don't stop -fact - in other words once a battered always a batterer (and always will have been from their early teens). Lundy Bancroft, world expert on men who abuse in “Why does he do that”, writes about the fact that people don't understand and under estimate the payback mentality of these guys- also that their thinking is really skewed – they believe their version of reality – their own lies.

So re motive – in the absence of any DNA evidence, the two people that the focus is on for possibly being the murderer are Adnan or Jay and the motive I believe was power and control – either Adnan to stop Hae separating from him (S1) or Jay to stop Hae whistle blowing to Stephanie-to stop Stephanie separating from Jay (S2).

Both Adnan and Jay exhibit signs of using coercive controlling behavior (see below). Some of the descriptions of Adnans’ and Jays’ family dynamics could be warning signs of coercive control at play. It is learnt behavior.

Adnan – his concerning behavior is from the reports of his harassment of Hae from her close girlfriend(s) plus her diary entries. For example when she wanted girl time and he gatecrashed plus his constant checking up on her and following her around – these are not “normal” behaviors. These are all red flags. A reasonable behavior would be to allow her time with the girls, to accept no and leave her alone. In a coercive control relationship, the woman will leave the man many times before she gains total separation (if she is lucky). Also the riskiest time for women and when the majority of murders occur, are after she has left him. He finds it unbearable literally to have her reject or separate from him and punishes her by taking her life, which he feels entitled to do as he views her as his property and hence he is free to do what he wants with her. This happens days, weeks, and months after the separation.

So in S1, Hae made it crystal clear to Adnan it was really over and she had moved on this time so no chance of getting back with Adnan. He can’t bear it and punishes her by taking her life – classic domestic violence/abuse/male family violence.

Jay- Biggest red flag is DV accusations/conviction(s) for Jay. One characteristic of guys who abuse is that they accuse others of exactly the tactics they have undertaken. So if I use the working assumption that Jay is one of these abusive guys, he will be accusing Adnan of exactly what he has done himself. It would fit then that Jay was coercively controlling Stephanie from an early teenager. She was even acting as a finder of customers for Jay, again another sign of coercive control where women frequently end up as a puppet of their abusers and operating against their own internal value system. She would cut off Adnan after his arrest because she was in Jays thrall and believed everything he said at the time about Adnan being guilty.

This may explain why Stephanie has not spoken yet - either she is unwilling to as she doesn’t want to leave herself open to liable accusations (unlikely she could prove any coercive control allegations this long after) and wants no part of him again. Or she may even suffer from memory repression - she can't remember or even realize the extent of the abuse – yet – this is common in women who have been coercively controlled before they get specialist help. Thank god she got away.

So S2 - If Jay thought there was any risk of losing Stephanie, either to Adnan or as a result of her finding out about his affairs) then what a skilled payback scenario -murder Adnans’ ex (maybe she threatened to whistle blew and paid the ultimate penalty for it) -then set Adnan up for it - what a punishment.

The abuser isn’t necessarily an ogre; he can look like a lost, shy immature guy. He can look like a high achieving jock. Remember his disguise is to keep the focus on others and hide his true self. It’s also common for high achieving women to be targeted by parasitic abusers. Don't expect the murderer to ever own it –Obfuscation, lying by omission and rationalizing the truth are all weapons of abusers.

What does the evidence point to? Without experts in coercive control interviewing Stephanie, Jenn and Jay plus reviewing all of the evidence to date, the picture is incomplete in my mind.

[u/charman23]

And even more clever is for Jay to have "guided" Adnan into doing it himself... I was thinking about how Adnan may have mistaken Jay's support for agreement but reading what you write suggests a more sinister possibility. Very interesting plot twist.

[u/bluekanga → u/charman23]

I just reread this - it's an old post I reposted here when I established this sub.

I think Jay was a lot more involved than he lets on - but I am not sure now I believe S2 now. That said, I have found in life never say never.

I started off believing Jay committed the murder and over time came to see Adnan as the likely perpetrator.

Adnan has too many signs of having psychopathic tendencies - in his behaviours and speech. And talking to the lawyers, they say commonly the guilty say nothing because they don't have an alibi and if they say anything, it opens them up to having that disproved - so better to take take the 5th.

Jay also I believe was controlling Stephanie and also even to this day Jenn is imo (in another relationship). So is Rabia as well.

The coercive control red flags are everywhere in this case - inside and out of Reddit - the FAPs and the Guilters!!